Founded in 1927 as the Portland Lip Reading club by two noted teachers of the deaf, the Hearing & Speech Institute is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization governed by a Board of Directors. Our mission is to empower people of all ages to achieve their full communication potential.

While much of the work of the Institute has traditionally focused on rehabilitation of people with specific clinical needs, our work is always accomplished in the context of that which makes us distinctly human - relationships - with a focus on all communication, both emotional and cognitive.

Serving people of all ages, the Institute's hearing health program provides auditory rehabilitation services focused on removing the relational isolation associated with hearing loss, whether for a child with hearing loss who needs immediate treatment to make the most of language learning years or an adult struggling to compete in the work force or maintain an active social life. The program provides personalized treatment plans that may include medical referral, education, auditory therapy or even hearing aids, always including family members in the process.

For children and their families, the Institute supports a program combining a number of service programs that we call the Developmental Home. The Institute provides a cutting edge, coordinated, multidisciplinary, team based care model for children who are experiencing social, emotional, and developmental challenges and their families. Our multidisciplinary team is made up of developmental/behavioral pediatrics, psychology, speech-language pathology, occupational therapy, and audiology. The entire team, with the family in the center, works together in an innovative approach that combines evaluation and case management with rehabilitative treatment services that optimizes developmental health outcomes for children.

The growing knowledge and research in the fields of developmental neuroscience, infant mental health and early intervention have resulted in emerging opportunities to provide developmental assurance for all infants and young children in the context of their relationship with their parents and caregivers. Developmental assurance involves the joint efforts of all individuals providing care for children to ensure that every child has the chance to grow up healthy, happy and able to interact productively within community.

The developmental assurance process starts at the beginning of life for all children. Assuring optimal development requires a robust early detection and prevention system to quickly identify developmental tragectories that require intervention. The Institute has set a goal for strengthening such a system, primarily focused on the primary care pediatrics office, a place that is accessed by the majority of children in the first years of life.

The early detection process may indicate the need for intervention. This comes at multiple levels ranging from tips from the primary care pediatrician to full intervention strategies for children and families experiencing more intense difficulties. In these cases, intervention and management may require team-based care with collaboration by and among the multiple systems that touch families of infants and young children. These might include but are not limited to medical, mental health, rehabilitation and early intervention systems, child care settings and home visiting programs, legal and family court systems, all in partnership with parents and caregivers. The Institute's role, in collaboration with each of these systems, is the identification of intervention strategies through ongoing assessment and case management, engaging with families to provide services that include not just support, education and intervention, but also developmental surveillance, screening, monitoring and referral. The Institute provides a number of direct intervention services in audiology, speech-language patholoty, occupational therapy, developmental/behavioral pediatrics, family therapy and psychology, consolidating these services in one location. It is these collaborative and team-based services that we have come to call the Developmental Home.

While the Institute maintains collaborative relationships with the many systems that facilitate developmental assurance, we also provide a range of multidisciplinary, team based intervention and rehabilitation services for children, all based on full engagement with and between children and their families. These services are part of and are tightly linked within the Developmental Home.

The process of promoting developmental assurance also requires a focus on professional training, collaboration, research promotion, and the introduction of new scientific knowledge about child development to the community. Using an interdisciplinary and collaborative approach, the Institute blends the different perspectives of medicine, mental health, speech-language pathology, occupational therapy, child development, early childhood education, and social services for young children and families in clinical and community presentations and seminars, as well as ongoing professional study groups. In addition, the Institute is committed to facilitating the implementation of the Developmental Home model in the community through consultation and partnerships with public and private individuals and institutions.

Our clinicians hold either masters or doctorate degrees and have advanced specialized training in their given fields, which include speech-language pathology, occupational therapy, developmental/behavioral pediatrics, neuro-psychology, clinical psychology, family therapy and audiology. All clinicians regularly participate in continuing education opportunities and are knowledgeable about the latest advances in their fields. The Institute is a teaching facility that frequently provides practicum and fellowship experiences for graduate and medical students.

Our offices are located in Portland, Oregon. Funding to support the services of the Institute comes from a variety of sources, including fees for service, contributions from individuals and corporations, foundation grants and fundraising events.